To Those Who “Love” Fat People But Hate Our Fat

Today I want to talk about the people who say things like: “We shouldn’t treat fat people badly, but they are unhealthy and we need to help them get thin and prevent other people from becoming fat.” I understand that these people are trying, so I also try, really hard, not to say “Hey, fuck off.” While this is certainly better than the “let’s shame, stigmatize, bully, and harass the shit out of fat people!” crowd, it’s still not ok.

While I appreciate someone treating me well, what I truly value is people respecting that I am the best witness to my experience. So when I say that my body is fine, that I’m happy with the path to health I’ve chosen, the proper response is “awesome”, not “Well, I don’t think you should be treated badly, but I do want to eradicate you and everyone who looks like you from the Earth and make sure that there are no more.”

I don’t intend to speak for anyone else, but for me – I am my body. The actual body that I live in. Someone either respects my body, or they don’t. Loving the thin woman they believe lives inside me is unacceptable to me. Because I know that there is no thin woman in there – I’m a fat woman who deserves to be treated with basic human respect regardless of what someone believes I could or should look like. I am the best witness to my experience, if someone wants to know about me – they should ask. They should not guess, or worse, have the audacity to think that they know better than me about me.

When it comes to me, if you hate the fat then you’re not allowed to love this fatty.

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Book and Dance Class Sale! I’m on a journey to complete an IRONMAN triathlon, and I’m having a sale on all my books, DVDs, and digital downloads to help pay for it. You get books and dance classes, I get spandex clothes and bike parts. Everybody wins! If you want, you can check it out here!

There’s a good book by Lynn Gerber that analyzes and compares dieting and gay “reparation” therapy : Seeking the Straight and Narrow, Weight Loss and Sexual Reorientation in Evangelical America. The author really lays out the puritanical beliefs about the body underlying both kinds of attempts to love the “sinner” while changing who he or she is.

You can *say* you love me and just hate my fat, but the thing is, once you start going over someone and mentally revising parts of them, it is no longer that person you love. It is a fictional character you’ve composited out of them, social ideals, and personal preferences. And I am *never going to be that character.* That’s not “defeatism,” it’s acknowledging the basic difference between fantasy and reality.

I know I’ve posted this before, but it’s always relevant to discussions like this:

“Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.” – C.S. Lewis

This is the basis for a wonderful book called “Villains By Necessity.” Basically, the “good guys” have decided to eradicate ALL evil, by whatever means necessary (including brainwashing and murder, as well as other various “evil” means), and a small band of villains have to save the world from good, because the “good guys” are literally destroying the entire world.

Unfortunately, the book was edited for a subsequent printing, and frankly, I liked the original version better. But even the edited version is still good, and really drives home the point.